As we approach the 2024 election season, the advertising landscape is poised for tremendous growth, with political ad spending projected to surpass $10 billion. With Kamala Harris entering the race, spending priorities have moved, especially in key states like Ohio, where the Senate race alone has already seen $300 million in ad spending.Connected TV’s (CTV’s) share of political ad spending is set to jump from 2.7% in 2020 to 12.8% this year. The Harris campaign is leading the charge, allocating $200 million for digital ads, much of which will go to streaming platforms.
During this political campaign marketing season, effective audience targeting is crucial, as it holds the potential to sway voters, shape public opinion, and ultimately determine election outcomes. In this blog post, we’ll highlight political audiences that can assist political campaigns and organizations in connecting with their desired audiences in a meaningful and impactful way.
Three political campaign marketing audience categories
Over 240 politically relevant audiences are available on-the-shelf of leading TV, demand, and supply platforms to help your political partners gain share based on three political audience categories:
- Political affiliations
- Political personas
- Relevant ballot initiative audiences
Let’s break down each category and which audiences you can use in your political campaign marketing to target voters this upcoming election season.
Political affiliations
Target audiences could include those who are likely to be in the Democratic, Independent, or Republican parties, or are likely to not be registered to a political party. Our political affiliation audiences use a foundation of voter registration data with Experian’s advanced statistical models to reach voters at scale, based on their political party.
Here are four audience segments that you can activate to target voters based on their predicted party affiliation:
- Political Affiliation > Democrat
- Political Affiliation > Republican
- Political Affiliation > Independent/Other
- Political Affiliation > Unregistered
Political personas
One key target audience could be voters who are likely to be influenced by a political candidate’s renewable energy program. Additional target audiences could include those who are likely to be influenced by a candidate’s position on the economy or healthcare.
Here are 10 audience segments that you can activate to target voters based on their viewpoints on key political issues:
- Political Personas > Political Unregistered Liberal Leaning
- Political Personas > Political Unregistered Conservative Leaning
- Political Personas > Committed Democrats
- Political Personas > Moderate Democrats
- Political Personas > Political Leaning Liberals
- Political Personas > Liberal Leaning Independents
- Political Personas > Conservative Leaning Independent
- Political Personas > Political Leaning Conservatives
- Political Personas > Moderate Republicans
- Political Personas > Committed Republicans
To reach voters who believe the environment is a key political issue, you can layer in our GreenAware audiences with our Political Personas audiences:
- GreenAware > Behavioral Greens
- GreenAware > Think Greens
- GreenAware > Potential Greens
- GreenAware > True Browns
- Psychographic/Attitudes > Shopping Behavior > Smart Greens
To reach voters based on their regional voting patterns, you can use our new battleground counties and district audiences:
- Affiliation Switcher Counties
- Battleground Counties
- House Battleground Districts
- Democrat Counties
- Republican Counties
- Independent Counties
Relevant ballot initiative audiences
You can also reach voters based on their attitudes and behaviors related to key ballot measures. Let’s walk through a few examples below and highlight relevant syndicated audiences that you can activate during the 2024 political campaign marketing season.
Local and national ballot initiative support
Consumer behaviors are often great predictors of down-ballot initiatives. For example, military families may show favor toward initiatives supporting veterans, households with children present may show more interest in school funding, and those interested in the environment will favor green initiatives. Experian offers an array of consumer behavior and interests audiences to help you fine-tune your targeting and messaging strategies.
- Lifestyle and Interests (Affinity) > Occupation > Military – Active
- Demographics > Presence of Children > Ages: 0-18
Charitable causes
Understanding where consumers are actively donating to charitable causes paints a clear picture into their political interests.
- Lifestyle and Interests (Affinity) > Charitable Causes > Contributes to Political Charities
- Consumer Financial Insights > Discretionary Spend – Donations > $1,000-$1,999
Demographics
Demographics play a critical role into voter opinions with presence of children, age, and household income influencing decisions at the polls.
- Geo-Indexed > Demographics > Household Income: $50,000-$74,999
- Geo-Indexed > Demographics > Education: Bachelor Degree
- Demographics > Presence of Children > Ages: 10-12
- Demographics > Marital status > Single
- Demographics > Ages > 19-24
- Lifestyle and Interests (Affinity) > Moms, Parents, Families > Mothers with infant child(ren) (0-3 yrs old)
Millions of campaign dollars were wasted in the 2022 midterm elections when voters were targeted with ads for issues and candidates they couldn’t vote for. Using advances in geo-targeting can help save wasted spend and ensure relevant messages reach the right voters.
Finance
Income and large financial decisions often trigger changes in perspective and influence voter behaviors.
- Financial FLA Friendly1 > Income > $1,000-$24,999
- Financial FLA Friendly > In Market New Mortgage
- Financial FLA Friendly > In Market Auto Loan
Media consumption and engagement
Media consumption and engagement offers great insights into how voter interest, current channel engagement, and engagement in political issues.
- TrueTouch: Communication Preferences > Engagement Channel Preference > Email Engagement
- TrueTouch: Communication Preferences > Engagement Channel Preference > Streaming TV
- Social Media > Snapchat
- Purchase Transactions > Ad Responders > Digital
- Television (TV) > Ad Avoiders/Ad Acceptors > Ad Acceptors
Mosaic
Proprietary persona-based audience solution that combines demographic and behavioral data to create a holistic view of voters and their interests.
- Mosaic – Personas – Lifestyle and Interests > Group O: Singles and Starters > O55 – Family Troopers
Occupation
Provides the opportunity to deliver targeted messaging on measures based on a consumer’s occupation.
- Demographics > Occupation > Management/Business and Financial Operations
- Demographics > Occupation > Sales
- Demographics > Occupation > Farming/Fish/Forestry
- Consumer Behaviors > At-Home: Retired/Empty Nesters
- Consumer Behaviors > Occupation: Education
Personal views
Understand consumers personal views around family, their social and work life.
- Psychographic/Attitudes > Personal Views > Work Centered
- Psychographic/Attitudes > Personal Views > Family Centered
- Psychographic/Attitudes > Personal Views > Social Isolation
We can help you match your message to your audience
With Experian’s political audiences, you can confidently execute your political campaign marketing, knowing our audiences are based on voter registration data and advanced predictive technology. Our highly accurate models are validated by our expert audience team to ensure precise targeting and drive impact and influence with the right audience. We understand that finding a trusted data provider can be a challenge, which is why we make it easy to access our syndicated audiences.
For a full list of all of Experian’s syndicated audiences, download our syndicated audiences guide.
You can activate our political audiences on-the-shelf of most major platforms. Can’t find the audience you’re looking for or need a custom audience? Connect with our audience team for more information.
Footnote
- “Fair Lending Friendly” indicates data fields that Experian has made available without use of certain demographic attributes that may increase the likelihood of discriminatory practices prohibited by the Fair Housing Act (“FHA”) and Equal Credit Opportunity Act (“ECOA”). These excluded attributes include, but may not be limited to, race, color, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, age, disability, handicap, family status, ancestry, sexual orientation, unfavorable military discharge, and gender. Experian’s provision of Fair Lending Friendly indicators does not constitute legal advice or otherwise assures your compliance with the FHA, ECOA, or any other applicable laws. Clients should seek legal advice with respect to your use of data in connection with lending decisions or application and compliance with applicable laws.
Latest posts
In a previous blog entry, Ordering sushi and a lesson in embracing the contextual marketing mindset, I showcased a fictitious scenario that required complex data point integration to pull off. These kinds of programs can seem overwhelming given the three barriers that many organizations face when embarking on their contextual marketing journey: Marketing sophistication A brand’s own conventional mindset and the programs that support it Actionable data Lack of clean and accurate data that prohibits real-time “on the fly” interactions Technology Disparate systems that are unable to link information across repositories, channels and interactions; inability to automate interactions in real-time Regardless of the barriers, there are ways you can show customers you’re listening and provide contextual messages without “boiling the ocean.” Take, for example, the recent viral blue/black vs white/gold dress debate. As the conversation spread throughout Facebook and Twitter, brands like Dunkin’ Donuts and Tide tweeted these contextual messages: The tweets did not go unnoticed as thousands of followers retweeted, commented and favorited these messages. The contextual elements used in these messages — channel preference and breaking/relevant news — are easily accessible to any brand. While the brands had to act swiftly, executing these messages circumvented the three barriers listed above. On the flip side, addressing the barriers can allow a brand to build more sophisticated, targeted contextual messages, as shown in the below example. Here, Experian Marketing Services and technology partner Movable Ink helped Finish Line deliver this sale announcement that adjusts based on the date and time the customer opens the email. The message remains relevant via a countdown clock during the run of the sale, a “warning” when it’s about to end and an alternative message after the sale ends — all of which ensures that the message is relevant regardless of when it’s opened by its intended recipient. And combining more contextual data points, such as location and stock, Finish Line includes the countdown, a local map to the customer’s nearest location and up-to-the-minute inventory of available sizes. Contextual marketing enables modern enterprises to engage in customer-centric conversations that — like any meaningful relationship — deepen across time and future points of engagement. This is particularly true in an era when consumers are overwhelmed by untargeted and disruptive marketing messages. By contrast, contextual marketing is designed to seamlessly and usefully merge into the customer’s daily activity. Want to know more and how to get started? Download the eBook From campaigns to context: Making the move to contextual marketing.
With online video viewing at an all-time high and television networks and system providers increasingly making video content available to those who don’t pay for television, many are wondering if we’re on the cusp of a massive spike in cord-cutting numbers. In our recent Cross-Device Video Analysis, Experian Marketing Services found that that 7.3 percent of all U.S. homes are cord-cutters, meaning they have high-speed Internet but don’t pay for TV. And the pace is increasing. In the last year alone, one million more homes joined the cord-cutter ranks bringing the total to 8.6 million households. It should come as little surprise that cord-cutting is on the rise. As we reported in our video viewing habits post, 57 percent of all American adults and 75 percent of Millennials now watch some sort of digital video during a typical week with the smartphone being the most commonly used device for watching video either streamed or downloaded from the Internet. Consumers thinking about cutting the cord will find an industry increasingly working to remove barriers that typically stand between cord-cutters and programming from their favorite networks — in exchange for a small fee. For instance, CBS recently announced the launch of CBS All Access, a digital subscription service that provides live and on demand viewing of CBS programming. And Dish Network launched Sling TV, an over-the-top pay service that allows cord-cutters to stream live and recorded programming from networks like ESPN, Univision, CNN, HGTV and more. With HBO announcing an April launch of their digital-only streaming service, HBO Now, March may be the last month that many pay for cable or satellite. If the cord-cutting ranks are, in fact, about to swell, a common question is: by how much? Experian Marketing Services estimates that there are currently 13.8 million Americans — representing 5.6 million homes — who are prime to cut the cord. Many of those individuals already have one foot out the door, if you will, given that they are more likely than average to say that they watch less television today because of the Internet. They are also more likely to watch HBO and be fans of at least one major professional sport making them good targets for Sling TV and HBO Now. Given that many cord-cutters already pay for Netflix and/or Hulu Plus, the net savings to those on the fence may be smaller than they think once they add up the costs they’ll assume from piecing together, à la carte, the various subscriptions and downloads required to keep watching their favorite programs. Whether or not we’re on the cusp of a major spike in cord-cutting, the fact is that consumers are increasingly getting their video content from digital sources and marketers need to understand where, how, when and what consumers are watching to ensure that their video campaigns are optimized for today’s digital consumer. For more information about cord-cutters and cross-device video consumption, including consumer receptivity to digital video advertising, download the Cross-Device Video Analysis.
Advertising Age recently released their annual Marketing Fact Pack, featuring data from Experian Marketing Services that looks at habits of digital consumers. This post highlights some of these findings. In the 2015 AdAge Marketing Fact Pack, we featured stats on key marketing and consumer trends impacting the advertising industry. Highlights include the lifestyle of the digitally connected consumer, including the habits of smartphone and television users, household and personal use of smart devices and the choice between becoming a cord-cutter and staying connected. An estimated 7.3 percent of U.S. households (8.6 million homes) today are considered “cord-cutters,” meaning they have high speed Internet but no cable or satellite television service. That number is up from 4.5 percent of households (5.1 million homes) in 2010, a comparative increase of 60 percent. Despite the growing number of consumers who use digital devices to watch video (as opposed to viewing on a television), it has not been enough to overwhelmingly convince all households to cut the cord. Instead, it seems as if the ability to stream or download video directly to the television is what ultimately seals the deal. As streaming devices like Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV and Google Chromecast become more common and as televisions themselves are increasingly connected to the Internet directly, we can only expect the number of cord-cutters to grow. To learn more about video viewing behaviors to improve your strategies for reaching digital consumers, register to join our upcoming webinar Online video: engaging consumers in a multi-screen world.